Assignment:
Write a piece of fiction for the duration of a single song, without revising. You may revise afterwards.
The song: Fredo Viola – “The Sad Song”
The fiction:
The first time she said my name, she half-sang it to me; each syllable filled her mouth with a slight longing, a desire to make me manifest out of the darkness, as if from a corner. The second time she said it, I tried not to well up; I’m overly emotional anyway, crying always at movies, at sappy love songs where the girl or boy dies and the singer is left wanting. The third time she said my name, I couldn’t hear her anymore; the sound of crowd around us had risen to a din.
I realized three months into our affair that I had fallen in love with her voice. I lusted after her sonorous tone with its fragile breaks in emphasis. I longed for her giddy inflection on her “can”s her “am”s, those verbs that indicated abilities or possibilities.
The night before she left, I crept into our house while she was in the shower. I came in quietly to listen; she would sing to herself in there. I wanted to hear the language she used in her songs, the nonsense lyrics that spilled out of her while she rinsed her hair, newly greyed, down the drain.
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